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The Swedish cunning woman Gertrud Ahlgren of Gotland (1782–1874), drawing by Pehr Arvid Säve 1870. In Scandinavia, the klok gumma ("wise woman") or klok gubbe ("wise man"), and collectively De kloka ("The Wise ones"), as they were known in Swedish, were usually elder members of the community who acted as folk healers and midwives as well as using folk magic such as magic rhymes. [10]
The cunning folk were professional or semi-professional practitioners of magic in Europe from the medieval period through the early 20th century. In Britain they were known by a variety of names in different regions of the country, including wise men and wise women, pellars, wizards, dyn hysbys, and sometimes white witches.
By Sam StokerORIGINSFolk magic in Britain can be traced back to the Mediaeval period, also known as the Middle Ages, which lasted from around the 5th to 15th century CE. Practitioners, cunning folk, were known as cunning men/women, and occasionally white witches (though the word 'witch' held a negative connotation) . These people practiced folk medicine and spellcraft, but were not actually ...
Owen Davies, who has worked on cunning folk before, estimated there was a cunning person for every five villages. I think it’s probably a little bit more than that because the records we do have surviving from this period are to do with the courts and prosecutions, so you only get evidence for these kinds of things when something’s gone wrong.
Oct 31, 2008 · In a recent article Willem de Blécourt highlighted how little we really know about cunning-folk in the context of European witchcraft, and stressed the need for further substantial research. The study of English cunning-folk in the early modern period has been well served by the work of Keith Thomas and Alan Macfarlane, but their respective chapters are, nevertheless, tantalising rather than ...
- Owen Davies
- 1997
Oct 21, 2011 · This project will consider the origins of cunning folk’s powers, their occupation and social status and the gender differences between practitioners. It will also explore the activities white witches were involved in and what tools they used to carry out their practices such as healing, finding lost goods and predicting future events.
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Aug 8, 2024 · But it is hard to conclude that service magicians did more harm than good. As Stanmore observes of the clients of cunning folk: ‘Instead of succumbing to the hopelessness they felt, they turned to magic – and, in doing so, they chose to hope.’. Cunning Folk: Life in the Era of Practical Magic. Tabitha Stanmore. Bodley Head, 288pp, £20.
